Raiders fans endure special difficulties living in Broncos Country

By Nick Groke

The Denver Post

Posted:
11/04/2016 11:27:49 PM MDT

Updated:
11/04/2016 11:28:35 PM MDT

In this Nov. 9, 2014 photo, a Raiders fans can hardly bear to watch the Broncos' 41-17 win in Oakland. Raider Nation, however, has found new life this season with their team currently sitting atop the AFC West at 6-2. John Leyba The Denver Post

Broncos at Raiders

When: 6:30 p.m. Sunday

Where: Oakland Coliseum

TV /Radio: KUSA (9) / 850 AM, 104.3 FM

DENVER — In a one-man Black Hole in his Denver basement, Chris Morris coughs up north of $350 every season to get kicked in the shins. He's an Oakland Raiders fan. Third generation. He bleeds black. But the NFL cable TV package he pays for every season comes with hidden costs.His wife, Deeanna Mondragon, loves the Broncos. She claims home-field advantage with the TV upstairs. And every time the Broncos score, she shouts down to the basement through an orange megaphone.

"She's yelling, 'Touchdown Brrrroncossss!' " Morris said. "For the past decade, I'm sitting down there paying a ton to watch my team get creamed while she's up there living life. That little orange megaphone ticks me off, I ain't joking.

"It's hard to be a Raiders fan."

In Denver, Raiders fans endure a special kind of difficulty. Strangers in their own home, they watched for years as the Broncos became the darlings of the NFL and lorded over them. Since 2011, the Raiders are 2-8 against the Broncos. Their head coach, Jack Del Rio, came from the Broncos. And their legendary owner, Al Davis, died five years ago.

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And now the Raiders seem bent on moving out of Oakland again, this time to Las Vegas. Their fans in Denver already were on an island in a sea of orange, but now they're adrift at sea. Who is this team anymore? Would the Las Vegas Raiders still be real Raiders? Does the Black Hole exist everywhere? How much change can fans take?

A lot, apparently, if their team is winning. The Raiders are back and just winning, baby.

And when the Broncos play at Oakland in a Sunday night game on national TV, the teams will meet for sole possession of first place in the AFC West. Denver, the defending Super Bowl champion, is 6-2. The Raiders are 6-2 for the first time since 2001.

This crossroads season in Raiders fandom doubles as a kind of revival. Del Rio, a former Denver defensive coordinator, coached his final game with the Broncos in a dispiriting playoff loss to Indianapolis after the 2014 season that led to head coach John Fox leaving. With the Raiders, Del Rio has flipped a 3-13 team into a contender with an aggressive, gambling offense. Quarterback Derek Carr ranks fifth in the NFL in yards passing.

But attendance for Raiders games at the Oakland Coliseum continues to lag, at an NFL-low average of only 54,189 fans per game. Even at percentage of capacity, the Raiders rank 29th in the 32-team league at 86 percent.

The team's owner, Davis' son, Mark, wants to move his team to Las Vegas. Last month, the owner of the Raiders persuaded taxpayers to cover his bill. The Nevada Senate approved $750 million in public funds for a new Las Vegas stadium to house the Raiders. The NFL still needs to approve a move, with at least 24 owners voting in favor. That decision probably won't be made until next year.

"I don't care if they move to Mars," Denver's Troy Martinez said. "I'll still be a Raiders fan."

Martinez lives in silver and black, a model Raiders fan. His family is from Oakland, but his parents always were Broncos fans. Like the Raiders' lovable bandit image, Martinez rebelled.

"I'm a Raiders fan because I just don't like the Broncos," he said. "In the 1980s, when the Broncos were going to the Super Bowl, I was like, 'I'm a Raider, I'm sorry. That's who I want to be.' I don't want to wear orange and blue. That's hideous."

Martinez meets every week with like-minded outlaws at the Cowboy Lounge in Denver, an oasis of Raiders fans in Broncos Country. Their team, by tradition, is the most hated team in the NFL. These fans embrace that image in the city of their archrival. If Raiders fans face the difficulty of an uncertain future, try living in Denver, home of the Broncos.

"I feel bad, with the whole move. I wish it wouldn't happen because it's tearing apart Al Davis' legacy," Martinez said. "But then again, he moved them too."

A movable franchise

Al Davis shuttled the Raiders, an original AFL team, from Oakland to Los Angeles in 1982, then back to Oakland in 1994. But instead of losing fans, he picked them up along the way. The Black Hole, where the hardest of die-hard Raiders fans meet in end-zone seats at the stadium, was born in 1995. A move to Las Vegas — as crushing as it may be to Oakland fans — would be welcomed by many in the Denver area. Flights from Denver to Las Vegas are shorter and less expensive. And there's more to do.

"I hope they move to Las Vegas," Morris said. "I'll buy season tickets. The Sin City Raiders just sounds great to me."

The divide between Raiders fans and the rest of the NFL is as stark as their team colors. Nobody is on the fence about the Raiders. Broncos safety T.J. Ward, who grew up in the East Bay, near Oakland, never copped a love for silver and black.

"I just don't like them," he said. "They're from Oakland. I just don't like the Raiders. I couldn't even tell you why. It's probably something that's bred in me, probably because I had a lot of friends who were Raider fans and we used to just argue all the time."

Since the AFL and NFL merged in 1970, the Broncos and Raiders ground out an equal footing — with a 45-45-1 record in 91 meetings. This season, the Raiders are 5-0 on the road and 1-2 in Oakland. And whether their team plays home games in California or Nevada or on Mars, Raiders fans will hold out hope of one day again moving ahead of the Broncos.

Even in Denver, Raiders fanatics can't step back from the silver and black. They never left, but now they're back.

"If Al Davis was alive today, he'd be one proud man," Martinez said. "This is the best I've seen the Raiders in years."

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